Edwin_m

They would have appeared there first as that was an "Express" route considered deserving of the (relatively) better quality units. When 158s arrived they pushed 155s and 156s onto other secondary Regional routes.

150s, 153s, 155s and 156s are 75mph too.

The 159s also had a modification to disable the saloon to vestibule door behind the cab (with an illuminated sign) when that cab was active, in case the driver needed to exit the train with no separate cab door. They certainly had this in 1996 but I'm not sure if it was a mod from new. Getting back to the original topic, Sprinters in multiple was very rare indeed in the BR days. One exception was my morning commute in 1987-88, two 150/1 units which came from Lincoln and Skegness, joined at Nottingham and split at Derby for Crewe and Birmingham. Coupling was literally hit and miss, especially if they tried to do it on the curved bit of the platform. It was abandoned in the 1988 timetable.

A modern multiple unit, driven according to modern "defensive driving" policies, may well have a rate of acceleration greater than the rate of service braking used in normal operation, so would be moving faster at the loop exit assuming the station is at the loop midpoint and speed restrictions allowed it. However, another reason for "straight entry" at loops is that a train approaching too fast has more distance to get under control before it hits the slow turnout at the far end of the loop.

As the right hand track has no signal alongside the one for the left hand track, it can only be used in the direction shown here.

I think it's actually a "Circuit not working stoply fuse, when blow no can replace"

Harlech is part of the Cambrian ETCS area with no signals and much more flexibility to send trains in either direction on any track without the cost of extra signalling (but still the risk of a train being unexpectedly at the opposite platform if service disruption creates a need for an unscheduled crossing move). With older signalling technologies, bi-directional running through a loop creates extra complication and probably needs extra signals, so the extra cost would only be agreed if there was a good reason. In the cases described above there is a benefit in being able to switch the box out without non-stopping trains having to slow down, or in only needing one platform for a lightly-used station.

You could just use a car battery, as these can supply huge currents. According to Wikipedia the cigarette lighter socket is likely to be rated at 10 amps.

I can't see how the proposal could possibly work. The "antenna" is shorted by every axle of every train and most of it is also track circuited, with variously insulated joints and receivers that rely on detecting similar (few hundred Hz) frequencies at much lower currents than would be needed to communicate with a submarine an ocean or two away. Some years ago I was involved in an experiment to measure the electrical impact of Croydon Tramlink on Network Rail where the two run adjacent between Birkbeck and Beckenham. Having closed the railway and shut off both 750V supplies, we hooked up a very large signal generator to circulate hundreds of amps at various audio frequencies out through the overhead wire and back through the rails. This loop induced only a handful of amps in the railway track some six feet away, though it did make some quite nice singing noises in the overhead.

If the power supply is properly designed then it will cut out rather than suffering any damage,, but you won't be able to run the heater.

Gizmo will eat the occasional pea that drops onto the floor, and now and again he has a nibble at the lawn without obvious ill-effect.

Pretty sure these are Burton-on-Trent. The canopy has gone but those bridges are pretty distinctive.

Not sure if you're questioning the similarity of the picture I linked in the quote, but I should have made clear it's taken from further north (presumably from a train) where the platform loop has ended and the tracks are converging with the shoreline.

This is the closest I can find on Geograph - similar view but not totally conclusive. https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5217030

That seems most likely to me. The Nissen huts don't appear on aerial mapping, but could well have disappeared in the intervening decades.